This is best article I’ve ever read on rape jokes: when they are funny, and when they are not, and why, with examples. How To Make A Rape Joke

I share her sentiments. It’s a great article, by Lindy West at Jezebel. I’ve always been a free speech absolutist who is nonetheless (1) opposed to people being hurtful dicks when they flap their gums and (2) quite capable of being an oblivious, hurtful dick when I flap my gums. West does a very nice job of explaining how (and how not) to exercise the freest of speech while remaining decent and humane.

I struggled with my word choices in the paragraph above, though. It’s that word “hurtful” — I don’t mean it quite literally. I mean something like “inflicting emotional pain”, yes. But avoiding that infliction, in my taxonomy of values, doesn’t cut too many onions when ranked against the importance of making one’s points, be they serious or funny or both. Some onions, yes; but not too many. Lindy West, though, talks about hurtful speech as if it’s literally harmful, like a blowtorch or a beating:

If you’re a comic performing to a reasonably full room, there’s a pretty good chance that at least one person in the audience has been sexually assaulted. If you didn’t know that, fine, now you do. Congrats. So when you make a joke in that room that trivializes rape or mocks rape victims, you are deliberately (because now you know!) harming those people. On purpose. Not because you’re a rapist—you’re probably not—but because you’re selfish and amateurish and lazy and scared.

It’s the one thing in an excellent article that I strongly disagree with. Because, no. Those people were harmed by their rapists. Of course it’s dickish to tell a joke that’s oblivious to that harm, or uncaring with respect to it; but we shouldn’t misplace responsibility for it by placing the responsibility on the shitty comedian who tells that joke.

it is an interesting article, im not sure i agree with all thats written, but what would i know, im a guy who has never been raped. so ive asked a friend of mine, a woman, who has been raped, what she thinks of this whole issue. she is quite open about fact she has been raped and has talked to many groups of ppl about it, i’ll post back what she thinks.

I don’t think the article illustrated its central point very well. If half the audience have to live with the very real threat of rape or sexual assault, it’s horrible to make those people the butt of a joke about rape or sexual assault. The article was clear that it’s wrong to make anyone in a position of vulnerability the butt of the joke. In the UK several comedians have been called out for making disabled people the butt of their jokes, and it’s the same thing. Comedy which laughs at people because they are vulnerable is out of date.

I agree with KaralynZ. I certainly don’t think that we can equate a dickish comedian with a rapist in the harm they do. But, I do think that they cause harm with rape jokes, and that they don’t care. It’s kind of like someone breaking someone else’s leg, and then a third person coming along and smacking the broken leg. That last person didn’t break the first one’s leg and isn’t responsible for that, but (s)he is responsible for the additional pain caused.

Lee, I think you and KaralynZ are making a category error. In fact I think it somewhat trivializes the harm of rape — and deflects some of our righteous condemnation of rapists onto people who speak unkindly about rape — to call both of those things “harm” like they are in the same category.

I think the article, Lee and KaralynZ are pretty accurate, myself. ‘Harm’ is a very vague word that can, rightly, encompass something as mild as a slap and as traumatic as rape. ‘Harm’ does, at least, afford the situation some degree of seriousness–the word ‘offend’ has been absolutely ruined by modern culture, robbed of all meaning. People have been conditioned to ignore anything that comes after someone saying “I’m offended”, so it’s not a word anyone who wants their concerns respected gets to use anymore.

Of course, there is a difference between simply being ‘offended’, and what happens when a rape victim hears this kind of material (or, I’ll concede, what MAY happen). I’m a woman who’s never been raped, so when I hear a rape joke, I groan, roll my eyes and say, “Really? Did you really NEED to make that kind of stupid joke?”, because I think they’re unfunny, insensitive and generally in poor taste.

dSomeone’s who’s been through it, though, will probably be brought back to–as that article may’ve said, but I’ve read a lot on this subject and it may be blurring together–the worst moments of their life. Remember that we’re specifically talking about live comedy. They’ll have gone out to have an especially good time, and instead someone will bring them back to the worst part of their lives–and a room full of people will be laughing as it happens. That’s terrible, and it’s more serious than “oh gee, that’s in bad taste, I really wish you wouldn’t say those things!”.

Many comedians are reasonably intelligent people, and talented enough to come up with loads of funny material without resorting to carelessly-written rape jokes. I think it’s pretty reasonable to ask that maybe they should give pulling those out of their repertoire a shot. At least, if they want people to stop calling them wildly insensitive, selfish jerks and gauging whether they’re the kind of people who they want to support based on that judgment.

One aspect of this is that male comedians who make rape jokes are doing it because they think rape doesn’t apply to them, only women. The comedian who started this is looks ‘cute’ (go track down a picture of him to see if I’m wrong.) So, he is just one drug bust away from getting to experience what it is like to be raped in the County Correctional Facility sometime. Maybe then he will be able to feel women’s pain over rape.

I disagree strangefriend, men are Very aware that they can be raped, why do you think so many men are afraid of homosexuals? It may not happen ‘that often’ (? I’ve never been through the potentialy crazy frat system), but it’s still a valid fear. There’s even a term “federal ‘pound you in the ass’ prison.” There are books written by guys who’ve been into these prisons as inmates that describe how to give up your anal virginity as a method of getting protection from the right kind of guy who’ll look after you, and Many men read these books “just in case I get put away some day.”

I disagree, Justin. Men’s fear of rape is nowhere near as strong as women’s. When I go out at night alone, there is not the constant fear that I am going to be abducted, beaten, and sexually assaulted– or even being attacked during the day (read Liz Gorman’s recent account in The Washington Post). Also, if you were playing to a roomful of Jews, would you make Holocaust jokes? It’s very unlikely any of them experienced it (or even knew someone who experienced it), but they would still be offensive.

Just wrt to the suggestion that “the victim is harmed by the rapist, not the comedian”… Suppose someone were to take a sharp knife and take a slice out of your buttock. Now I come along and toss a handful of salt into the wound. Are you saying that I haven’t harmed you? My actions are just reminding you of the original damage perhaps?

Bruce, your analogy illustrates my point rather nicely. You’re talking about two separate physical attacks. The point I’m making is that a person’s reaction to speech — however “painful” or traumatic — is not “harm” in the same sense.

Not everyone agrees with this, which I knew going in. But it’s becoming clearer to me that some folks don’t even comprehend the argument, which is something of a surprise given that it’s rather central to the defense of the concept of freedom of speeech. We all learn this in kindergarden: “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words may never hurt me…”

I think some people might not agree with the phrase learned in kindergarten, actually. Rape is a psychologically scarring act, not necessarily a physically harmful one (although it obviously can be). A black eye goes away. Words, delivered in certain scenarios, by certain people, can stick with a person and contribute to all kinds of psychological pain and general unpleasantness. 99% of the school harassment I remember is shit people said, for instance, although I’m sure I got shoved around and scraped and all that, as well.

Now, that looks like I’m trying to make things like that exactly equivalent, and I’m not. . .but the suggestion that something has to be physically violent to be meaningfully hurtful is a little off, in my opinion. Psychological and emotional abuse wouldn’t exist if that were true.

Basically, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words may never hurt me” is nice and theory, and all, but just doesn’t work in practice. Look to all the suicides committed by bullied youth for evidence of that. I’d say it probably makes it all worse, really, because people who continue to be hurt by “just words” will think back to that sentiment, and beat themselves up over how weak and worthless they are, etc.. Maybe if the occasional person saying gross things is the only thing going wrong in an otherwise shining and wonderful life, it’s easy to let it roll off your back–but it normally isn’t.

I always find it kind of ugly that people will sooner say “grow thicker skin!” to someone who’s hurt, than “stop being an asshole” to the person who’s saying hurtful things to them. I never hear any of these critics of rape jokes saying that rape jokes should be censored by the government; “free speech” and “freedom from criticism” are different things, and – fortunately! – the public is perfectly free to call people inconsiderate jerks for telling rape jokes.

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